The Kindle’s DRM software keeps a person from sharing his or her Amazon e-books with other people, or reading them on non-Amazon platforms. Hacks for it have existed since 2008, with at least some of the early work being done by a person going by the name “Dark Reverser.” (He didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.)

Over e-mail, i♥cabbages said that the new hack builds on those previous efforts, but makes the process simpler since it doesn’t require the person to even own a Kindle. “It is ‘better’ in the same way that Kindle for PC itself is better — all it requires is a PC. This circumvention combined with my tools for decrypting Adobe DRMed books (used by Sony’s Readers) and Barnes & Noble DRMed books (used by the Nook) allows consumers to read a book from any current e-bookseller on any current e-book reader device,” wrote i♥cabbages.

He asked to be only identified as a U.S. citizen living in the U.S. who works in the computer security space.

Amazon didn’t respond to a request for comment.

For Amazon, DRM cracks could cut into e-book sales by allowing people to share pirated copies of books on file sharing networks instead of buying them from Amazon. Publishers say that e-book piracy, like that of digital music and movies, is a growing threat to their business.

Circumventing DRM technology is illegal under the Digital Millennium Copyright Act, or DMCA. However, some of the people who have used these cracks say they do so because they want to be at liberty to read their e-books on whatever device they choose, be it the Kindle or a Sony Reader or B&N Nook.

“Primarily, I view DRM as an unnecessary restriction on legitimate freedoms, such as format shifting and fair use of copyrighted material,” wrote i♥cabbages. “By making it as easy a possible to become such a ‘criminal,’ I seek to socially normalize DRM circumvention and use of the freedoms DRM inhibits. I have trust that democratic societies will not long allow the criminalization of socially acceptable behavior. And thus ultimately I hope to increase support for a freer society.”

Groups such as the Electronic Frontier Foundation have also taken up the mantle that DRM is bad. “DRM on e-books is about protecting business models and technology platforms, not about protecting authors,” said Fred von Lohmann, a senior staff attorney at the EFF.

Yet DRM has plenty of defenders among businesses, and it was commonly used on digital music files in the early efforts by that industry to find a business model online. In the past, Amazon has said it puts DRM on books when publishers and authors ask it to.

Amazon has so far resisted joining a chorus of other gadget and e-book stores (including Sony and Barnes & Noble) that are using an industry standard called Epub along with DRM software from Adobe to make their e-books more interoperable across different devices and platforms.

So far, i♥cabbages said that Amazon has done little to technically prevent the hacks from working. “I’ll know for sure if they start releasing a [Kindle for PC] update every few days and/or send a DMCA takedown notice for my blog/post,” said i♥cabbages.